# Poetry and Transformation

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Peter E. Murphy, Poetry and Transformation, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> Poetry and                                       Resumen
> Esta narrativa, basada en la experiencia de
> Transformation                                   vida del autor, se enfoca en cómo la evolu-
> ción de su atracción a y amor por la poesía
> finalmente transformó su vida. Mezclado
> PETER E. MURPHY                                  con esta historia personal reveladora está
> el análisis del autor de cómo la relación
> entre poesía y fe—especialmente en la
> Abstract                                         manera en que la poesía se relaciona con la
> This narrative, based on the life expe-          Palabra Revelada—puede tener un efecto
> rience of the author, focuses on how his         dramático en la lucha de uno por lograr
> evolving attraction to and love of poetry        la transformación personal en medio de
> ultimately transformed his life. Blended         circunstancias preocupantes de crisis y tu-
> with this revealing personal story is the        multo. El autor examina además la mane-
> author’s assessment of how the relation-         ra en que al exponerse a este arte creativo
> ship of poetry and faith—especially as           uno puede ser asistido en comprender y
> poetry relates to the revealed word—can          aplicar la “Palabra Creativa”.
> have a dramatic effect on one’s struggle
> for personal transformation in the midst                            ONE
> of troubling circumstances of crisis and
> turmoil. In addition, the author examines        In the park surrounding the Imperial
> the manner in which exposure to this cre-        War Museum in London, a large slab
> ative art can assist one in comprehending
> of concrete, twelve feet high by three
> and applying the “Creative Word.”
> feet wide, is slowly falling apart, expos-
> ing its skeleton of rusted steel rebar.
> Resumé
> Cet article, fondé sur le vécu de l’auteur,      Despite its appearance and strength,
> relate comment son intérêt pour la poésie        concrete is in motion. As soon as the
> a évolué au point que son amour de cet art       molecules in the cement that bind it
> a fini par transformer sa vie. Parallèlement     harden, they start to unfasten in a pro-
> à ces révélations personnelles de l’auteur,      cess that can take hundreds of years.
> l’article évalue comment le rapport à la         Poured in 1961, this slab is not old by
> poésie et à la foi, en particulier le rapport    concrete standards and should be hold-
> entre la poésie et la parole révélée, peut       ing up better, but it is a segment of the
> avoir un effet retentissant sur la lutte de      Berlin Wall, which was constructed
> l’individu pour sa transformation person-
> quickly and cheaply. During the wall’s
> nelle alors qu’il est aux prises avec des cir-
> active duty, 136 people were killed
> constances troublantes en période de crise
> et de tourmente. De plus, l’auteur examine       trying to cross over from East to West
> comment l’exposition à cet art créatif peut      Germany. Before the slab was retired
> aider une personne à comprendre et à ap-         to this beautiful park it was painted
> pliquer dans sa vie la « Parole créatrice ».     with graffiti. In one painting, a pair of
> cartoon eyes overlooks a huge Rolling
> 8                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> Stones red tongue covered with white
> letters that proclaim, “Change Your
> Life.” The artist “Indiano,” who graf-
> fitied much of the Berlin Wall, likely
> chose these words from a sonnet by
> Rilke that ends with the admonition,
> “Du musst dein leben ändern,” or “You
> must change your life” (“Archaic Torso
> of Apollo” 14).
> Like concrete, poetry is also in
> transition—a poem is created over
> many revisions that can take, for me
> at least, decades before it is complete.
> Unlike concrete, a poem is bound by
> image and sound, metaphor and voice.
> A poem, as Archibald MacLeish fa-
> mously wrote in “Ars Poetica,” “should
> not mean / But be” (23-24). My own
> “Ars Poetica” reflects on the relation-
> ship between the other concrete—the
> one relating to the senses—and the
> abstract.
> ARS POETICA
> 
> The thin wires that brace the rods in place
> are not that tough as I twist them
> around bars of ribbed steel. And they quiver
> when I slurp over them tons of redi-mix.
> 
> In Cardiff, I burned a winter chopping holes
> through concrete. My jackhammer heated
> then sliced the steel, knocked loose gray chunks,
> snapped the slender wires like the bones of a finger.
> 
> As centuries tick, the stiff sides of buildings
> conceal molecules of cement unbinding
> into sand, aggregate, and water.
> 
> All the making becomes unmaking
> that implodes silently, spewing light and heat
> as it breaks back through the abstract.
> (Many Mountains Moving 93)
> Poetry and Transformation                             9
> 
> While the abstract is the subject       I say. I’d rather they argue. I need to
> of poetry, it is also its enemy. The ab-   provoke them.
> stract has no flesh, no blood, no thing.      “Who wants to dance?” I ask.
> It is soul and spirit, incomprehensible       They look confused. I point to Lisa,
> without form. The poet’s job is to give    a special education teacher in Camden.
> the abstract a body, which can only be     She hesitates, terrified, then stands
> done using physical language. Poems        and comes to the front of the room.
> are little machines made out of words.     She wonders if she should have taken
> If the words are not the right words,      oil painting instead.
> the machine will not work. A success-         I arrange Lisa so that she is stand-
> ful poem will offer a different expe-      ing two feet in front of me. I say, “I
> rience each time an attentive reader       am a writer and you are my reader. Are
> engages with it. And without the at-       you ready?”
> tentive reader, a poem, no matter how         She nods her head. She’s game. I look
> well crafted, will be meaningless. As      her in the eye, squeeze her hands, and
> William Carlos Williams portrays in        say, “Don’t drink and drive.”
> “Asphodel, That Greeny Flower,”               “What?” she says.
> “If you drink and drive,” I continue,
> It is difficult              “you are going to crash your car and
> to get the news from poems                 kill yourself and someone else. Do you
> yet men die miserably every day      understand?”
> for lack                        Lisa nods her head again.
> of what is found there. (161–65)              “Did you know that in 2010, 10,228
> people in the United States died in
> TWO                       drunk driving crashes? You don’t
> want to be one of them, do you? No,
> I am standing in front of a group of       of course not. Do not drink and drive.
> teachers who want to write poetry.         OK?”
> They have given up two weeks of               Lisa giggles nervously. The other
> their summer vacation to attend the        teachers are laughing, relieved I didn’t
> Artist Teacher Institute at the Rich-      pick them.
> ard Stockton College of New Jersey,           “Very good,” I say. “Lisa is my per-
> cosponsored by Arts Horizons and the       fect reader. She gets that my story is
> New Jersey State Council on the Arts.      factual and without ambiguity. I don’t
> They will write poems while others         want to confuse her with metaphor. I
> in the institute are painting, dancing,    want her to clearly understand what I
> and making books, collages, and dig-       am writing, to consider it, and to be-
> ital photographs. These teachers are       have accordingly.”
> enthusiastic, earnest, smart, and ex-         I lift Lisa’s hand and point out how
> hausted. They write down everything        we are joined.
> 10                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> “Your job as a writer is to connect     the words I have written.
> with your reader. But this is nonfic-          “Let’s complicate the story.” Plac-
> tion. How does the relationship be-        ing my palms against Lisa’s palms, I
> tween writer and reader change when        say, “Let’s make believe that Charles
> writing imaginatively?”                    has just left a party, say, in Philadel-
> I turn back to Lisa. “OK, let’s dance   phia. He gets in his Subaru, turns on
> again,” I say, and I place my palms        the ignition, and is driving home on
> against her palms. “I am going to tell     the Atlantic City Expressway when he
> you a story. It’s a true story. I made     realizes he is drunk. As the writer, I
> it up a long time ago. Do you believe      have to describe what is going on in
> me?”                                       Charles’ mind so that Lisa, the reader,
> Lisa, confused, smiles nervously as     can understand it. If I’m successful,
> I move our palms around and around         she will feel and think what I intend
> in a circle as the other teachers giggle   her to feel and think. Lisa, again, is my
> like fourth graders.                       perfect reader. She has to work harder,
> “How shall I begin?” I say aloud.       but notice how she is keeping up with
> “It is a dark and stormy night, and my     me.”
> character—let’s call him Charles—is            I let go of Lisa’s hands and she
> driving home from work when his car        looks relieved and heads for her seat.
> breaks down. A kind stranger stops         But before she gets there, I say, “Not
> and offers Charles a ride. Grateful, he    so fast. I want you to read my poem.”
> gets in the car, buckles up. Charles is        “Oh, no,” she complains, “can’t you
> not in the car very long when he re-       pick on someone else?” But she turns
> alizes that the driver is drunk. My job    back toward me and raises her hands. I
> as the writer is to show you, the read-    raise my hands above my head and say,
> er, what Charles, an invention of my       “Read my poem.”
> imagination, is seeing, thinking, and          As she reaches toward my hands, I
> feeling.”                                  pull them farther away.
> I lead Lisa in a little dance. Our          “Hold still!” she demands, as if I
> hands are palm to palm, and as I slow-     were one of her unruly students. The
> ly move mine around in a circle, hers      other teachers laugh.
> move with me.                                  “What’s wrong?” I ask the class.
> “Again, Lisa is my perfect reader,      “Why can’t she ‘get’ my poem?”
> but this time, she has to work harder          “She’s trying,” a teachers says, “but
> than when I was writing factually. I’m     it’s out of reach.”
> not telling her what to think or what          “That’s right,” I say. “Lisa is trying,
> to do. I am using description, narra-      but my poem is too private, too per-
> tive, and dialogue to explore the com-     sonal. It’s impossible to understand it.
> plex emotions that my reader can only      This is a not a good poem.”
> understand and appreciate through              I lower my hands to face level and
> Poetry and Transformation                              11
> 
> start moving them slowly in a circle.       lateral, rather than literal, thinking. It
> Lisa raises her hands to grab them,         requires being comfortable with ambi-
> but mine slowly move away. Her hands        guity, what Keats called ‘Negative Ca-
> mirror the movement of my hands.            pability,’ which he defined as ‘being in
> Occasionally they touch, but they are       uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, with-
> always in proximity. My hands move.         out any irritable reaching after fact
> Hers move with mine. Our hands keep         and reason’ (Keats 43). Teachers are
> moving.                                     often afraid of poetry because there is
> “How’s this?” I ask.                    no answer key, and when they do teach
> “She’s trying,” one teacher says.       it, they frequently present a poem as a
> “She’s almost there.”                       puzzle that is to be solved rather than
> Another says, “Even though she’s        language to be experienced.”
> not touching, I think she’s getting it.”        The teachers nod their heads. They
> “You’re right,” I agree. “This is a     have been there. But they are here
> good poem, and Lisa is a good read-         now, and they want to learn to read
> er. While she may not understand            and write poetry, and to teach it so
> or appreciate everything the poem is        that their students will not tune them
> offering, she is getting a lot out of it    out when they do.
> because she is trying hard. Metaphor            “I am going to recite a poem. It’s
> doesn’t reveal itself easily. If my poem    deep—very deep,” I say dramatically.
> is about sorrow, perhaps this reader is     I raise my hands, making an exagger-
> feeling one of its cousins, sadness or      ated gesture, look into their eyes, and
> grief. If my poem is exploring spiri-       say, “I am lonely.” They stare at me.
> tuality, perhaps the reader feels some-     Nothing. I wipe my eyes as if tearful
> thing like devotion or reverence. E.        and fake hurt feelings. “Oh, you stu-
> E. Cummings titled one of his early         pid people, you. I poured out my soul.
> books, Is 5, which is the answer to the     I expressed myself. I told you how I
> common mathematical question, ‘2+2          felt, and you just looked at me. I will
> equals?’ If you’re a physicist and are      recite my poem again, and this time,
> trying to land a rocket on Jupiter, 2       I hope you will be sensitive enough to
> plus 2 better equal 4 or you’re going to    understand it.”
> miss Jupiter by a billion miles. Howev-         I raise my hands in an even more
> er, if you’re writing a poem that is try-   exaggerated gesture and repeat, “I am
> ing to explore the universe of human        lonely.” I am making a fool of myself.
> thought, emotion, and spirit, 2+2=5         The teachers are enjoying this, espe-
> will get you close enough.”                 cially Lisa.
> Lisa returns to her seat as her col-        “So, what’s wrong with my poem?”
> leagues applaud.                            I ask.
> “This is why people, even educated          Lamar, who teaches in Atlantic
> people, don’t read poetry. It requires      City, says, “You just said how you feel,
> 12                  The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> Murph. That’s not a poem. That’s a             tree . . . car. Then you hear that heart-
> Hallmark Card.”                                breaking second line and you see the
> “Exactly. And like most greeting           tree without leaves in your backyard
> cards, it is clichéd and sentimental. My       or in the forest, perhaps the only tree
> poem offers nothing original, but the          without leaves, or maybe they are all
> greater problem is that it is abstract.”       without leaves, and then the strip mall,
> “Abstract?” Lamar asks. “I thought         car . . . car . . . tree without leaves . . .
> poems are supposed to be abstract.”            car. The point is that you can see it,
> “Poems are about the great ab-             and because your senses are aroused,
> stractions: beauty, death, failure, faith,     you can also feel it. The poem has be-
> friendship, God, honor, loss, love,            come part of you.
> truth, etc.; but in order to render               “Poems that only express are writ-
> these abstractions you must use con-           ten on one level. They are too accessi-
> crete words that appeal to the senses,         ble and shallow. They are not written
> SSSTT.”                                        with much attention to craft. Poets
> “SSSTT?” Lamar repeats.                    who merely express themselves wind
> “Yes, Sight, Sound, Smell, Touch,          up boring whatever audience they
> Taste. Everything we know, we have             may have and, eventually, they bore
> learned through our five senses. This          themselves. In his “Preface to Lyri-
> is the animal part of us. Once we have         cal Ballads,” Wordsworth wrote that
> taken in the experience of the world,          ‘Poetry is the spontaneous overflow
> we use our mind and our spirit to dis-         of powerful feelings . . . recollected in
> cover and reveal thoughts and emo-             tranquility’ (Lyrical Ballads 42). Recol-
> tions. We create the world after the           lection or reflection is usually part of
> world allows us to know it, and we can         the revision process, and that’s where
> only know it through the senses.”              craft comes in.”
> I wait a moment. They are thinking            “I know what revision is,” Lamar
> this over.                                     says, “but what do you mean by it?”
> “Let me revise my poem,” I say. “I            “Revision doesn’t mean to correct
> am a tree / without leaves.”                   or to fix a piece of writing. That’s
> The teachers make the kind of              editing. Revision means to re-see. Po-
> sound I hear when a poem connects              ems have a life cycle, just like people.
> with an audience.                              Your first draft is like a newborn baby
> “It’s still a bad poem, but it’s a great   leaking at both ends, or as Shakespeare
> revision. It doesn’t tell you what to          wrote in As You Like It, ‘Mewling and
> think or feel. It presents you with an         puking, in the nurse’s arms’ (2.7.147).
> image that allows you to make mean-            You don’t say it’s a bad baby because
> ing out of it. Picture the tree, perhaps       it can’t walk or talk, and you don’t
> in your backyard, perhaps in a forest,         ‘correct’ it. What do you do? You clean
> perhaps in a strip mall, car . . . car . . .   it up and you love it. This is revision,
> Poetry and Transformation                             13
> 
> and as you revise, your poem grows            secret forces you to write close to the
> smarter and stronger. It begins to            bone, creating a sense of intimacy that
> walk and gets in trouble. When it tries       will connect with your reader. The
> to stick its fingers into the wall socket,    lie—by which I mean, use your imag-
> you have to discipline your poem and          ination—cloaks anything too private
> say, ‘No.’ As you continue revising, the      with something fanciful. This is what
> poem grows into adolescence, becomes          leads to discovery and surprise. And
> rebellious and says ‘no’ to you. Maybe        to paraphrase Frost, if there’s no sur-
> you’ve written fifteen drafts, maybe          prise in the writer, there’s no surprise
> you’ve written fifty. Robert Hayden           in the reader. You want your read-
> wrote almost one hundred drafts of            er to discover something new when
> “Those Winter Sundays.” If you work           they read your poem. Otherwise why
> hard and are patient and lucky, your          should they bother?
> poem might become an adult and go                “Does anyone else have a question?”
> out into the world and be published.             “So, Murph,” Lamar asks, picking
> Then it will take care of you when you        up his notebook, “how did you become
> are old, can’t walk, can’t talk, and are      a poet?”
> leaking at both ends.”
> It is lunchtime. Time to break.                            THREE
> “OK, let me give you an assignment.
> I want you to write a lousy first draft.      My father, Eddie Murphy, was prob-
> Can you do that?”                             ably the only longshoreman in New
> They laugh. “We can do that,               York City who aspired to perform at
> Murph,” Lamar says.                           Carnegie Hall. Although he attend-
> “Write a poem that questions some-         ed high school for just a few months
> thing you believe in. Include in it an        before his father pulled him out to
> office supply and the title of a song.        work on the docks—it was the De-
> Also tell a secret and tell a lie, and nev-   pression—he loved classical music
> er tell anyone which is which.”               and saved enough to buy a used piano,
> “What?” they shout in unison.              which he stuffed into his bedroom in
> “Forget the office supply and song         a small apartment overlooking 18th
> for a moment,” Lisa complains. “You           Street and 10th Avenue. After World
> want me to tell a secret?”                    War II broke out, he enlisted in the
> “Yes. Any other questions?”                army and was stationed in Newport,
> “But a secret?” Lisa interrupts.           Wales, unloading ships that fueled
> She’s not going to let me get away            the D-Day invasion. When one of his
> with this. “That’s something you don’t        longshoreman buddies discovered that
> tell anyone. Why would you ask us to          a nearby pub, the Windsor Castle Ho-
> do that?”                                     tel, had classical music, Eddie stopped
> “I’ve also asked you to tell a lie. The    in. He was disappointed that the music
> 14                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> was recorded, not live, but when the       me because I didn’t know how to make
> beautiful young woman behind the           my bed. One night at dinner, she beat
> bar asked what he wanted to drink, he      me again to make me eat sweet pota-
> didn’t want classical music anymore.       toes that were nauseating me. When
> He wanted her.                             I vomited them up on my plate, she
> Thelma Elias Samuel lived in a          made me eat that too. After relatives in
> tiny room in a tower at the top of the     Queens took us in and sent us to a pub-
> pub managed by her older sister and        lic school, I thought they had changed
> brother-in-law. Eddie asked Thelma         my religion from Catholic to Public. I
> to go to the cinema with him, but she      didn’t know what sins the Publics be-
> refused. He persisted for months until     lieved in and was afraid of accidently
> she finally gave in, and they became       committing a Public sin and winding
> engaged in May 1944, a few weeks be-       up in Public Hell. A few years later
> fore D-Day. Eddie stormed Normandy         at another Catholic school, a popular
> and survived, but he was wounded in        priest invited me to his rectory office
> Belgium a few months later and sent        on Saturday mornings. After locking
> home. After the war, he returned to        the door, he wrestled with me. At first,
> Wales to marry Thelma. They moved          he let me win, but then he “wrestled”
> to New York, where my older brother        dirty, and I felt dirty, but he said it
> was born in 1948, and Eddie made the       wasn’t dirty and not to tell anyone,
> transition from working on the wa-         so I didn’t tell anyone. But I felt dirty
> terfront to operating cranes and other     anyway and knew I was going to Hell.
> heavy equipment in the city’s booming          At fifteen, I decided that I could re-
> construction industry. Thelma wasn’t       main a Catholic or I could be happy. I
> happy being so far from her family, so     decided to be happy, and stopped trying
> they moved back to Newport, where          to believe. I started writing poetry, and
> I was born in 1950. She wasn’t happy       I started drinking. I drank at parties
> living so close to her family, so we re-   and started hanging out with friends.
> turned to New York. Then we returned       Then I started drinking alone. My fa-
> to Newport. Then back to New York. I       ther had remarried, and my religious
> crossed the Atlantic three times in my     stepmother put coins under the stat-
> first three years. Thelma, unhappy in      uettes in her bedroom, which I tapped
> Wales, unhappy in the United States,       each month for drinking money. While
> finally took her life when I was seven.    the lesser saints might only have a
> Because my father couldn’t take         nickel or a dime, St. Christopher, her
> care of us, my brother and I got           favorite, was good for a quarter, and
> moved around, attending four differ-       the Virgin Mary usually gave up fifty
> ent elementary schools. At a boarding      cents. Not much, but a quart of beer
> school on Staten Island, a nun made        cost only thirty-five cents back then.
> me take off my clothes before beating      While she usually caught me doing
> Poetry and Transformation                            15
> 
> other things, she never questioned me       record. I was proud of myself. Then
> about the statuette’s money. I think        I started drinking again, and “It can’t
> she believed that the saints accepted       get any worse!” got worse. I was edi-
> her gifts to buy whatever extras they       tor of the yearbook and kept the dark-
> might need in Heaven.                       room refrigerator stocked with beer
> Two years later, I decided I could be   purchased with money from selling
> happy or I could be a poet, so I chose      yearbook subscriptions, which I failed
> to be a poet. I hadn’t read much poetry     to repay because I was fired from my
> and didn’t know of any poets except         after-school job for showing up drunk.
> for Dylan Thomas, famous for being          After high school I flunked out of three
> Welsh, for being drunk, and for dying       colleges in three semesters. The only
> young. My man! I believed that living       decent grade I earned was in a theol-
> life gritty would make me a better          ogy class, where I wrote a paper on
> poet. If I experienced all aspects of       poetry and religion. I used examples
> the world, I could better express my        from Ginsburg, Ferlinghetti, and oth-
> feelings about it. When I came across       er “Beats” to argue that religion was
> Allen Ginsburg’s “Howl”—so honest-          choking society while poetry opened a
> ly degenerate, so morally depraved, so      conduit of human thought, emotion,
> human—I could feel a heart beating in       and spirit that not only liberated the
> every line.                                 poet but would also unite people in an
> My father, a drinker himself, re-       enlightened community.
> ferred to New Year’s Eve as “Amateur           I stopped using capital letters in my
> Night,” and as a senior in high school,     writing because I thought they were
> I was an amateur on New Year’s Eve          unjust. Why should one word be cap-
> 1968. I didn’t remember much, but           italized and not another? The names
> what I did remember, shooting heroin,       of days and months are capitalized,
> terrified me. Here’s the conclusion of      but the names of the seasons aren’t.
> a poem I wrote.                             Shouldn’t they be equal? I also didn’t
> use punctuation. Instead, I left a small
> There’s more here, living, than           space where a comma should be and a
> to meet at the bar.                   longer space for a period. Surprisingly,
> If I can go straight for a little         my professor, a Franciscan Priest, ig-
> while,                                nored that.
> Who knows?                                   My brother was serving in Viet-
> Better things may come and I              nam. I wanted to support him, but as
> May find them.                            the war went on I couldn’t see that it
> It can’t get any worse!                   had any purpose. I marched in demon-
> (unpublished manuscript)         strations, but when fights broke out on
> a picket line at the Washington Monu-
> I didn’t drink for three weeks, a         ment, I realized that protesting wasn’t
> 16                  The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> the answer. Trouble is, I didn’t know         received a note from Howard Moss,
> what was.                                     who encouraged me to write more and
> After college number three let me          to try him again. I didn’t realize how
> go, I decided to be near what I loved,        rare it was to get a personal note from
> which was drinking, and got a job             the poetry editor of the New Yorker.
> tending bar at a night club in Queens. I      I tried a few more times, and How-
> took writing workshops at the YMCA            ard Moss continued to write person-
> on 92nd Street with two well-known            al notes, but my poems were getting
> poets and usually showed up sober,            worse, not better, and eventually I
> but not sober enough to learn any-            gave up. God bless you, Howard Moss.
> thing. I read poetry, but not enough to       You tried.
> understand anything. I worked on my              At nineteen I got engaged to a
> poems, but not enough to make them            young woman who was in worse shape
> any better. Despite this lack of effort,      than I was. She came into the club
> I considered myself a poet. When I            where I worked a few days after she
> read at an open mic at a bar in Man-          was released from rehab, where she’d
> hattan, a drunk yelled, “Take it all off !”   kicked her heroin habit, and both our
> Obviously, he knew I was an imposter.         lives spiraled downhill from there. I
> I wrote a series of “bar” poems. This         tried to break it off, but I kept going
> one, perhaps, was the most successful.        back. Break off. Go back. Break off.
> Go back. This lasted almost two years
> FLORIDA (FOR RATSO)                 before I realized I would have to go
> far away to get away. Although I was
> A man fainted tonight.                  born in Wales, I didn’t know anything
> I asked him to get up—nothing.          about it. I had no other ideas, so I got a
> I loosened his collar and placed        passport, quit my job, and on Septem-
> ammonia under his nose.                 ber 11, 1971, a week before my twen-
> His shoes came off and then some.       ty-first birthday, I took off. I stayed in
> His wallet told me nothing.             the British Isles for almost a year. It
> I kicked him—                           was the smartest thing I’d ever done
> He ignored me.                          in my stupid life.
> I lay down next to him                     As I was hitchhiking in West Wales,
> demanding that he listen to reason.     a driver dropped me off in a village
> I put my head on his chest.             whose name I could not pronounce
> and told me the locals recited poetry
> I lay there, still                      there at night. The pub was noisy. A
> waiting.                                dozen men were arguing in Welsh.
> (unpublished manuscript)                They stopped as I walked to the bar.
> Welsh nationalists had been trying to
> I sent it to the New Yorker and          preserve their native language from
> Poetry and Transformation                             17
> 
> becoming extinct and their culture             A few months later, December
> from becoming diluted by England,           1971, I was hitchhiking through Lon-
> their powerful neighbor to the east.        donderry so unaware of my surround-
> While a few protests were violent—          ings that I didn’t realize Northern
> most notably an attempted bombing to        Ireland was at war. This was a month
> disrupt the investiture of the Prince       or so before “Bloody Sunday,” when
> of Wales in 1969—most were peace-           soldiers shot twenty-six people during
> ful. A popular strategy was painting        a peaceful demonstration, killing four-
> over English street signs so non-           teen of them. I wanted to head down
> Welsh drivers would get lost.               to Limerick to see what I could find
> “May I have a pint, please?”             out about the “limericks.” I got a ride
> The man behind the bar didn’t            from two men in a three-wheeled milk
> move. There was something Dodge             truck; they agreed to take me to the
> City about this place, and it was as if I   Irish border near Donegal. From there
> had walked in wearing a black hat.          it was a straight run down the coast.
> “Where are you from, lad?”               The men were angry, but because their
> I turned around. One of the men          brogues were so thick, I wasn’t sure
> stood there.                                why, until finally I understood: that
> “New York,” I answered.                  morning in the Bogside, the Catholic
> “You’re American?”                       neighborhood where they lived, sol-
> “Yes.”                                   diers had shot two of their friends.
> “You’re not English?”                       All over the city were barriers
> If I knew better, I would have said,     manned by British soldiers armed
> “Screw the English.” Instead, I said,       with automatic weapons. Each time
> “No, American.”                             we came to one—and they were fre-
> “What are you doing in Wales?”           quent—the driver cursed at the sol-
> “Hitchhiking around. I heard you         diers who studied us as we drove
> might have a poetry reading tonight.”       slowly around a maze and over speed
> “So you like poetry?”                    bumps. When we reached the last of
> “Yes.”                                   these barricades, kids began throwing
> He hesitated, looked around, made        rocks at the soldiers who were lifting
> a decision, and said, “OK. We need to       their weapons. The driver sped up—to
> finish our business, and then we’ll give    distract them? To take the fire? I didn’t
> you some poetry. Shouldn’t be long.”        know—and he ran the maze at thirty
> He went back to the other men, and       miles an hour instead of the posted
> they resumed arguing. I turned around       five. When I heard gunfire I hunkered
> and there was a pint of beer on the bar.    down, trying to make myself as small
> I didn’t know what they were arguing        a target as possible. While I didn’t
> about, but I had a feeling it was about     believe in God, I am sure I must have
> more than spray-painting street signs.      prayed. The driver stopped his truck
> 18                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> a few miles down the road, pointed to      a rocket ship or that the halo around
> the west, and said, “Run!”                 the babe in the manger was a space
> I ran.                                  helmet. I told him what happened in
> Safely over the border in the Repub-    Londonderry, and we both agreed the
> lic of Ireland, I dropped my backpack      world would be better without reli-
> and allowed myself to feel both fear       gion. Mathew and I recognized each
> and anger. I thought it unfair to be       other as outsiders. Neither of us was
> shot at in a war that had nothing to       happy with our lives, our families, our
> do with me, a war I didn’t even know       societies. We wanted lives that made
> was going on. And how stupid! Both         sense, lives that connected and had
> sides were killing each other over a       meaning. We probably listened to too
> God that didn’t exist. While I didn’t      much John Lennon, who was at the top
> know much about it, I could appreciate     of the charts,
> the war two years earlier between the
> Muslims and the Jews because they be-          Imagine there’s no heaven
> lieved in different Gods. Catholics and        It’s easy if you try
> Protestants believed in the same one.          ...
> They are on the same team. Obviously,          Imagine all the people
> I was unaware of the Reformation and           Sharing all the world.
> the long history of hatred between             (“Imagine”)
> them. Then I had an idea. “Why are
> we killing each other because of our       As Mathew left to sketch in front of
> religions, our nationalities, our races?   the church, I went in pursuit of the
> Why can’t we see that we’re all human      limerick, which took me to an old
> beings?” I’m brilliant! I thought. I had   two-story building. On one floor was a
> an original idea. I knew it was original   library and the other a museum, both
> because I’d never heard it before. Then    tended by a little old lady who had
> I found a pub and drowned my origi-        never heard of limericks. “Can you re-
> nal idea and my brilliance.                cite one for me?” she asked. The only
> I checked in at the youth hostel in     ones I could think of were too dirty,
> Limerick, where I met a young Dub-         so I said no and left. I wandered down
> liner named Mathew Kennedy. He was         to the River Shannon and sat on the
> a sidewalk artist who set up outside St.   bank looking at the water. The river
> Augustine’s Church and sketched na-        was beautiful, in a gray, ashy kind of
> tivity scenes with chalk. He despised      way. The sky was gray too, and the
> what he called the “old fakers” who        air reeked of smoke from coal fires
> flocked into the church to make deals      used to heat the houses. I liked the
> with God. Unless you looked closely        smell. I was a city kid. Growing up in
> at his sketches, you wouldn’t notice       New York, my only experience with
> that the tree in the background was        anything close to a countryside was
> Poetry and Transformation                            19
> 
> the occasional expedition into Cen-          strange—“The Emperor of Ice
> tral Park, where, once, while playing        Cream,” “The Man on the Dump,” “An-
> softball (drunk, of course), I fell into     ecdote of the Jar,” “Disillusionment of
> a manhole. However, since traveling          Ten O’Clock,” and my favorite, “Thir-
> in the United Kingdom and Ireland, I         teen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird.”
> was beginning to like nature.                The imagery fascinated me: “I was of
> The first person to take me seri-         three minds, / Like a tree / In which
> ously as a poet was Hubert Babinski, a       there are three blackbirds” (3-6).
> professor at college number two, who            I think I liked Williams’ poems most
> encouraged me not just to write but to       of all. They didn’t have the flashiness
> read poetry. He introduced me to the         of Hopkins’ language or the mystery
> poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins,              of Stevens’ imagery, but I felt I un-
> Wallace Stevens, and William Carlos          derstood them in a more organic way.
> Williams. I read Hopkins’ poems over         In his poem, “The Manoeuvre,” while
> and over. I didn’t like that they were       watching starlings land on telephone
> religious, but his poems were wild,          wires on a windy day, Williams inter-
> and when I read “Pied Beauty,” “The          rupts himself to say, “that’s what got
> Windhover,” and “God’s Grandeur”             me—to / face into the wind’s teeth”
> aloud, my mouth was happy.                   (7-8). “[T]hat’s what got me—” he
> wrote like I talked. I didn’t know poet-
> And for all this, nature is never          ry could do that!
> spent;                                       Hubert told me that these artists’
> There lives the dearest               poems were driven by sound and im-
> freshness deep down things;               age compared to Ferlinghetti and
> And though the last lights of the          Ginsburg, who used narrative to move
> black West went                           their poems. I hadn’t thought about
> Oh, morning, at the brown             “moving” a poem before. I just wrote
> brink eastward, springs—                  what was floating around in my head.
> Because the Holy Ghost over the               I read these poems repeatedly, try-
> bent                                      ing to make sense of them in those
> World broods with warm                rare periods when I wasn’t drunk.
> breast and with ah! bright                Hubert helped me see where my own
> wings. (“God’s Grandeur” 9–14)            poems were original and interesting,
> and where they were not. I realized
> I loved that “ah!” stopping the flow      that the poems I wrote while high
> of the poem to emphasize the last            were not as good as I’d hoped. This
> two words, “Bright wings.” I wished I        troubled me. How could I “expand my
> could buy a pair. I didn’t understand        consciousness” if the poems I wrote
> Stevens, but I loved the authority of        while stoned weren’t as good as the
> his voice, and his titles were brilliantly   ones I wrote when straight? One of
> 20                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> my efforts, written under the influence,   was Wordsworth. He looked old. I
> made a gerund out of every word.           picked up a book and read that he had
> died in 1850. Wordsworth is one of
> Driving toing Buffaloing                 those dead poets I despised without
> alonging theing Newing Yorking           ever having read. That stupid shep-
> Thruwaying . . .                         herd tricked me, I thought, so who’s
> (unpublished manuscript)         the stupid one?
> I bought the cheapest book there, A
> When I told Hubert I was going          Choice of Wordsworth’s Verse, for sixty
> to Wales, he suggested that I stop at      pence, and hiked back to Ambleside.
> the Lake District if I found myself in     I read all the poems in the book, and
> Northern England. I planned to stay        everything did a flip-flop because I
> there one night on my way up to Loch       loved Wordsworth. I was shocked. He
> Ness to look for the monster. After        wrote mostly about nature, but that’s
> checking into the hostel at Ambleside,     not really what he was writing about.
> I met a shepherd who asked me what         He was writing about emotions that I
> I did. I said, “I am a poet,” which is a   recognized: joy, excitement, fear, won-
> ridiculous thing to say, especially to a   der, despair.
> stranger.                                     Some of the poems, such as “Mi-
> “A poet, are you?” he said. “What       chael,” “Nutting,” and “She was a
> do you think of our poet, William          Phantom of Delight,” were about peo-
> Wordsworth?”                               ple very different than me, but I felt
> “Never heard of him.”                   like I knew them. I was moved most by
> “Never heard of him? Well then,”        a poem about Tintern Abbey in Wales.
> the shepherd said, “you should go pay      Wordsworth was trying to relive the
> him a visit.”                              excitement of his first visit there five
> “Where does he live?”                   years earlier:
> “Walk along this path. His house is
> just a bit down the road in Grasmere.”       I came among these hills; when
> I decided to visit this William             like a roe
> Wordsworth. Maybe he would offer             I bounded o’er the mountains, by
> me a cup of tea and a biscuit. I walked        the sides
> “a bit down the road,” which turned          Of the deep rivers, and the lonely
> out to be three miles, when I saw a            streams,
> sign saying “Wordsworth Cottage.”            Wherever nature led: more like
> Wow, I thought, intimidated, he’s got          a man
> a sign. Inside, a woman welcomed             Flying from something that he
> me. Was this Mrs. Wordsworth? The              dreads, than one
> walls were full of books for sale and        Who sought the thing he loved. . .
> pictures of somebody whom I figured          (“Tintern Abbey” 68-73)
> Poetry and Transformation                             21
> 
> Traveling alone through Wales and       sacredness of the ordinary. Williams
> the Lake District, I realized how much      wrote, “No ideas but in things” (“Pa-
> I liked nature; no, it was more than        terson” 15). He probably would not
> nature—it was the whole universe of         have gotten there if Wordsworth
> what I had been seeing, hearing, smell-     hadn’t come up with “whereby ordi-
> ing, and feeling but did not have the       nary things should be presented to the
> language to understand. Wordsworth          mind in an unusual aspect” (“Preface
> was giving me that language, and I          to Lyrical Ballads”).
> loved him for it.                              Forget the Loch Ness monster, I
> When I read “Intimations of Im-         thought, as my one day in the Lake
> mortality,” I recognized the phrase,        District turned into a three-week
> “The child is father of the man,”1 and      excursion. I walked, as Wordsworth
> realized that Al Kooper from Blood,         walked, from Ambleside to Grasmere
> Sweat, and Tears was quoting Word-          to Cockermouth to Coniston to Hawk-
> sworth when he used it as the title of      shead to Kendal to Rydall Mount and
> the band’s first album. Al Kooper and       back to Ambleside, all the while read-
> Wordsworth—amazing. I connected             ing and rereading his poems. I felt as
> to a nature poet dead 120 years and         though my brain was getting bigger,
> wondered how this could happen. I           the opposite of blacking out after
> walked back to Grasmere the next            drinking, which I was trying to do less
> morning and put down three pounds,          and less. Back in Grasmere, I wrote
> fifty pence—half my weekly budget—          a nine-page elegy to Wordsworth,
> on Lyrical Ballads and Other Poems,         the longest poem I had ever written.
> and read them and reread them. I was        “Eight Yew Trees” was set in the
> excited as Wordsworth ranted against        cemetery where he planted them and
> the “vicious poetic diction” of the past,   where he, his wife, his sister, and a few
> while pledging to bring his own lan-        of his children were buried. My poem
> guage near to the language of men:          concludes,
> “an indistinct perception perpetually
> renewed of language closely resem-            . . . Your place is simple,
> bling that of real life” (Lyrical Ballads     A monument of stone
> 42). I didn’t realize how radical this        Chipped from local rock
> was at the time, but it’s this kind of                  by a local craftsman
> boldness that attracted me to poetry          Who knew your disdain for
> in the first place. Reading the preface            public sepulchers
> reminded me of the poems I read by            And what could not compare
> William Carlos Williams, which were           To yew tree memorials
> also written the way people speak.                      as lasting as your poems.
> Both poets seemed to celebrate the            (unpublished manuscript)
> 1 A Choice of Wordsworth’s Verse, p. 91.
> 22                 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> This was strange. I wasn’t writ-          but they were so nice. They said they
> ing about myself. I was writing about        had a new religion and that there were
> someone else’s suffering and how, de-        fifty of them in the world. Or maybe
> spite the decomposition of the body, it      they said there were fifty in Ireland or
> might be possible through language to        Limerick? I don’t know, but they gave
> live on after death—what Wordsworth          me this card and invited me to come to
> was obsessed with: immortality.              a meeting tomorrow.”
> Limerick was not a beautiful city,            We studied the card, which had a
> but the river, the sky, the buildings, the   handwritten quotation neither of us
> coal smoke—I was overcome. A great           could understand.
> and brutal weight had been lifted from            “It’s a religion,” I said. “They’ll just
> me. Like Wordsworth encountering             start another war.”
> a supernatural presence on Mount                 After thinking about it, Mathew
> Snowdon, I felt something breath-            said, “Yes, Peter, but there’s only fifty.
> taking and magical at the bank of            Maybe we can talk them out of it.”
> the River Shannon, something much                “Maybe,” I said, “they’ll offer us a
> greater than anything human I had            cup of tea.”
> come across. I didn’t know the word              Then I showed Mathew my poem
> “awesome,” but that’s what it was. I         about the Holy Spirit. “It’s astonish-
> took out my notebook and wrote,              ing,” he said. “I know exactly what you
> mean. There’s something profound
> Here, Holy Spirit.                         about Limerick. Maybe this new reli-
> There, Holy Spirit.                        gion has something to do with it.”
> Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit.         Something was profound about
> Sea gulls, Holy Spirit.                    Limerick. Five years earlier, a young
> Gray sky, Holy Spirit.                     woman from Belfast, Lesley Gibson
> Coal smoke, Holy Spirit.                   (Taherzadeh), had moved in, becom-
> Rocks, cars, dogs.                         ing the first Bahá’í to live there. She
> Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit.     worked as a speech therapist at a hospi-
> (unpublished manuscript)          tal for children with special needs. She
> was joined a few months later by Gil-
> Like Hopkins, I had written a poem        lian Phillips from Wales. The Catholic
> about the Holy Ghost, a religious            Church was the law of the land, and
> poem. What kind of atheist was I? I          Lesley and Gillian didn’t want to stir
> wanted to see if Mathew could make           up trouble, so they lived quiet Bahá’í
> sense of it. Before I could show him         lives. They prayed together, made
> my poem, he said, “Peter, I met these        friends, and gradually introduced
> people, and something amazing hap-           their new friends to the Bahá’í Faith.
> pened. I wasn’t very polite to them          Another Bahá’í, Stanley Wrout, moved
> when they said they liked my drawing,        to Limerick from England in 1970,
> Poetry and Transformation                            23
> 
> but he drowned just three months af-       then I noticed three older women and
> ter settling in. His death galvanized      thought, no, they can’t be high, not
> Gillian and Lesley, who met every          with the old ladies around.
> Tuesday evening in a “fireside,” and          I sat on the floor and asked a guy
> prayed that others might attend. As        next to me, “What’s this about?”
> more Bahá’ís from the United States           “The Earth is one country,” he said,
> and the British Isles moved to Lim-        “and mankind its citizens.”
> erick, they formed a Local Spiritual          “What?” I said, startled. “That’s my
> Assembly in April 1971. One Tuesday        idea. I thought of it last week. Where
> night Lesley’s fireside was inundated      did you get it from?”
> by a group of longhaired young peo-           “Bahá’u’lláh wrote it over a hundred
> ple who were part of a band, “Jeremi-      years ago.”
> ah Henry.” that was popular in Ireland        “Who?” I didn’t understand what
> at the time. They all became Bahá’ís       he said. With his brogue, it sounded
> that night. When Mathew met Lesley         to me like “Bahooligan.” I asked him
> on the street two months later, there      to repeat the name several times but
> were fifty Bahá’ís in Limerick. Soon       still didn’t get it, so I called his guy
> there would be hundreds.                   the “Big B.”
> As more locals became Bahá’ís,             He said that Bahá’u’lláh was the
> there was a backlash from the clergy,      fulfillment of each of the world’s re-
> who preached against it from their         ligions, not just Christianity, but Ju-
> pulpits. This actually helped spread       daism, Islam, Hindu, and Buddhism
> awareness of the Faith. When one           as well. “Bahá’ís believe in bringing
> young woman told her grandmother           the world together and eliminating
> she had become a Bahá’í, she respond-      prejudice.”
> ed, “Oh yes, I heard about them. They         This can’t be a religion, I thought.
> seem nice.” Another young woman            It makes too much sense. When I ar-
> became a Bahá’í when her friends did.      gued that religion causes more wars
> After her parish priest confronted her     than it prevents, he told me that ‘Ab-
> and demanded that she give it up, she      du’l-Bahá, the son of Bahá’u’lláh, said
> decided to think for herself, remained     that if two people are arguing about
> a Bahá’í, and was the first pioneer to     religion, they’re both wrong.
> the city of Wexford. Limerick was on          “If this faith becomes the source of
> fire, a Bahá’í fire, and while we didn’t   disunity it should be disbanded.”
> realize it, Mathew and I were about to        “You’re kidding.”
> be touched by its flames.                     “No.”
> When we arrived at the house the           “But you believe in God, right?
> next day, we found a mob of young          That can’t be good.”
> people there. They all seemed so hap-         “The Bahá’í concept,” he explained,
> py, I thought they were on drugs. But      “is that God is an unknowable essence.
> 24                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> No matter what we say about Him,            widow of a famous Bahá’í the group
> Her, or It, it’s just our imagination.      referred to as a “Hand of the Cause.”2
> We can only know what the Manifes-             “What happened to the rest of
> tations tell us.”                           him?” I asked.
> “Manifestations?”                           The women laughed. Not bad, I
> “Yes, messengers like Moses, Je-         thought. If these Bahá’ís could smile
> sus, and Mohammed. They’re like the         when someone makes fun of them,
> lamps, and God’s message is the light.      maybe they won’t start a war. Then
> It’s renewed every time a new Mani-         she called the meeting to order, picked
> festation comes. The spiritual teach-       up a prayer book, and began to read.
> ings are the same, but the social teach-       “Is there any Remover of difficul-
> ings change according to the needs of       ties save God? Say: Praised be God!
> society.”                                   He is God! All are His servants, and all
> When he mentioned the oneness            abide by His bidding!” (Bahá’í Prayers
> of religion, I remembered getting in        28).
> trouble when I was eight years old for         I was horrified. I was usually the
> attending a Cub Scouts meeting held         “difficulty.” Was this Bahá’í God going
> in the basement of a Lutheran church.       to “remove” me? Would I be sucked
> When he mentioned the oneness of            up by a giant vacuum cleaner in the
> mankind, I remembered the pastor of         sky? Would I just disappear? Praying
> my church speaking out from the pul-        was stupid, a waste of time. When I
> pit against a “Negro” family that had       was a kid I knelt against my bed each
> moved into the neighborhood. When           night reading psalms aloud. I prayed
> he said that each person must inves-        for things. I prayed to be happy, and it
> tigate and decide whether the Bahá’í        didn’t work. But when I listened to the
> Faith is true, I believed it was true. At   Bahá’í prayers, I was surprised by the
> least I wanted it to be true. But when      beauty of the words, and then some-
> he said that Bahá’ís don’t do drugs or      one recited this one:
> drink alcohol, I knew I couldn’t be a
> Bahá’í. While I hadn’t done drugs for         O Lord! We are weak; strengthen
> a while, I drank alcohol, and I didn’t        us. O God! We are ignorant; make
> want to be a hypocrite. And while the         us knowing. O Lord! We are poor;
> Bahá’í God made more sense than the           make us wealthy. O God! We are
> god I didn’t believe in, I wasn’t ready       2 There is no clergy in the Bahá’í
> to abandon my life of nonbelief.            Faith. Hands of the Cause were chosen
> One of the American women, Hort-         by Bahá’u’lláh and His successors to both
> ense Bredehorst, welcomed Mathew            promulgate and protect the Faith in its
> and me to her home and introduced           early days until its “Supreme Body,” The
> her two housemates, Mary Lou Mar-           Universal House of Justice, could be es-
> tin and Doris Holley. Doris was the         tablished which occurred in 1963.
> Poetry and Transformation                             25
> 
> dead; quicken us. O Lord! We are         week. Mathew and I returned to the
> humiliation itself; glorify us in        Bahá’í house every day, asking more
> Thy Kingdom. If Thou dost as-            questions, trying to understand the an-
> sist us, O Lord, we shall become         swers. We spent all night at the hostel
> as scintillating stars. If Thou dost     talking about it. When the book finally
> not assist us, we shall become           arrived, I didn’t understand many of
> lower than the earth. O Lord!            the English words, and I was confused
> Strengthen us. O God! Confer             by the Persian ones. However, I knew
> victory upon us. O God! Enable us        that the Bahá’í book was important, so
> to conquer self and overcome de-         I wrapped it in plastic and kept it safe
> sire. O Lord! Deliver us from the        in my backpack. After saying goodbye
> bondage of the material world.           to Mathew, I left Limerick for Cork,
> O Lord! Quicken us through the           where I had been invited to a Bahá’í
> breath of the Holy Spirit in order       fireside.
> that we may arise to serve Thee,            At the youth hostel in Cork I met a
> engage in worshiping Thee and            guy who told me that this Bahá’í Faith
> exert ourselves in Thy Kingdom           couldn’t be any good if they believed
> with the utmost sincerity. O Lord,       in Muslims. “They’re murderers,” he
> Thou art powerful. O God, Thou           said. “Stay away from them.” He told
> art forgiving. O Lord, Thou art          me about the Crusades and about the
> compassionate. (Promulgation 457)        evil things they did, and I was con-
> fused. If the Bahá’í God said that
> I was weak. I was ignorant. I was       Muslims were OK, then how could
> poor. And much of the time, especial-      they be murderers?
> ly when drinking, I was “humiliation          I was the only non-Bahá’í at the
> itself.” How did this Bahá’í God know      fireside. They referred to me as a
> that? He wrote this prayer for me,         “seeker.” I had never thought of my-
> especially the sentence, “O God! En-       self that way, but when I heard the
> able us to conquer self and overcome       word, it kind of made sense. A special
> desire.”                                   guest, who had come down from Dún
> I needed a drink.                       Laoghaire to speak, asked me if I had
> Instead, I asked if they had books I    any questions. I told him what the guy
> could read. They said they would get       in the hostel said and asked, “Do you
> one from Dublin. I was only planning       know anything about Muslims?”
> to be in Limerick a few days, but I de-       His name was Adib Taherzadeh
> cided to wait for it. Despite the fact     and he knew quite a lot about Islam.
> that the Bahá’ís believed in God, and      In fact, he said that his family had been
> prayed, and didn’t drink, I wanted it      Muslims but had become Bahá’í in Iran
> to be true. In fact, I made believe that   when Bahá’u’lláh was alive. I didn’t
> I was a Bahá’í and didn’t drink that       entirely understand what that meant,
> 26                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> but I felt something powerful, as if I     Morgan from Caerphilly. I had been
> had shaken the hand of the hand that       drinking the first time I went looking
> had shaken the hand of Jesus.3             for a job, and at a construction site, I
> I left that night convinced that       walked across freshly poured concrete.
> whatever problems Christians might         The next day, sober, I was hired as a la-
> have about Islam, they weren’t prob-       borer on a construction site at Cardiff
> lems for me. The Bahá’í Faith made         University. I was to be paid forty-two
> sense. Too bad Bahá’ís believed in         and a half pence—about a dollar—an
> God. Too bad Bahá’ís prayed. Too bad       hour. However, because I didn’t have
> Bahá’ís didn’t drink. I liked Bahá’í and   Garry Morgan’s tax records, fifty per-
> probably believed it, but I knew I could   cent emergency taxes were to be with-
> never live a Bahá’í life for more than a   held until I produced them.
> few days.                                      My boss, Nobby, asked each payday,
> “Do you have those tax records yet?”
> FOUR                         “Not yet,” I answered, sometimes
> forgetting my faux Welsh accent.
> After spending the Christmas holidays         “You sound American,” he said one
> with my recently discovered family in      time.
> Wales, I wound up living in a commune         “Uh . . . I lived in Canada for a
> of sorts in a working-class neighbor-      while,” I bluffed. He knew I was lying,
> hood in Cardiff. The terraced house        but he didn’t press me. Sometimes I
> had four bedrooms on two floors, one       forgot my assumed name and when
> bathroom, and between fifteen and          Nobby called “Garry, Garry, GAR-
> twenty people and two dogs crashing        RY!” I forgot to answer. When they
> there at any given time. Among us          hired another laborer named Peter, I
> were two runaways, a fifteen-year-old      really messed up. Nobby called “Hey,
> girl who’d fled the Troubles in Belfast,   Peter,” and we both answered. Again,
> and a sixteen-year-old Moroccan girl       he let it slide.
> hiding from her family in Cardiff to          My job was to haul stuff from one
> avoid forced marriage to an uncle. The     place to another and clean what Nobby
> others were a mix of Welsh and En-         told me to clean, until one day when
> glish, collecting seven pounds a week      Nobby pointed me to a jackhammer
> on the dole, which they used to get        and my life became hell. I drilled holes
> stoned.                                    through the concrete floor so they
> I needed a job, so I bought a work-     could install the pipes and wires that
> ing card that said my name was Garry       made the building hum. After working
> 3 Adib Taherzadeh went on to become     ten-hour shifts six days a week, all I
> a member of the Universal House of Jus-    could do at night was sit in a chair and
> tice on which he served from 1988 to his   shake, my beer spilling down my chin.
> death in 2000.                                I was drinking more and more and
> Poetry and Transformation                            27
> 
> getting more and more depressed.            questions and didn’t force anything on
> I was too broke to quit my job and          me except tea and biscuits. They made
> too broken to keep working. Hubert          me feel a better person than I really
> Babinski had written that he would be       was, and that I could make a difference.
> in Prague in the spring, and I wanted       It was March, and Viv was fasting
> to meet him there, but when I contact-      during daylight hours, something I
> ed the Czech embassy, they told me I        didn’t understand. On my second visit,
> would have to prove I had money, ho-        I stayed too late to catch the bus back
> tel reservations, and transportation in     to Cardiff, so they invited me to sleep
> order to get a visa. I had none.            over. This was the first time in months
> Meanwhile, conditions at the house,     I’d had a bed to myself, so I welcomed
> which were never great, were dete-          it. I also wanted to see if Viv was
> riorating. We slept in shifts, three or     really going to get up before sunrise
> four in a bed at a time, and were all       to eat breakfast.
> infected by lice. We went to the clin-          I was awakened before six as he
> ic where we were given a humiliating        was making tea in the nearby kitchen.
> lecture on personal hygiene complete        Soon Rita joined us and we ate an early
> with leaflets and individual bottles of     breakfast together.
> shampoo laced with DDT. There was               “Let’s say some prayers, now, all
> little money for food and few coins to      right?”
> feed the meter that sparked the “elec-          “Uh . . . OK,” I said reluctantly.
> tric fire” in the living room that heated       “Blessed is the spot,” Viv began.
> the rest of the house. Two women,           Then Rita read the “Remover of
> girls really, had miscarriages in a two-    Difficulties,” and I had that feeling
> week period. One night, an irate father     again, that I would be removed. I
> forced his way in the front door and        didn’t read a prayer when asked. I
> dragged his naked daughter out by the       didn’t want to be a hypocrite.
> hair. Turns out, he was high up in the          “Peter,” Viv said, “we’re having a
> Cardiff Constabulary, and after that, a     meeting next Sunday with a speaker
> police car remained parked in front of      from London. Why don’t you join us?”
> the house.                                      “I’m not sure,” I said, not wanting
> I wondered if there were Bahá’ís        to commit, not wanting to get too
> in South Wales. Looking through the         close to the Bahá’ís, afraid they were
> phone directory, I was surprised to         rubbing off on me. However, Viv and
> find a Bahá’í couple in Newport, the        Rita were so kind to me, I didn’t want
> city where I was born. Viv and Rita         to disappoint them, so before I left, I
> Bartlett welcomed me as if I were a         said I’d be there.
> younger brother. Viv was a teacher, and         Back in Cardiff, I was miserable.
> Rita, pregnant with their first child,      Exhausted from the jackhammer, I quit
> was a puppeteer. They answered my           my job and spent the week getting as
> 28                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> drunk as possible. The police in front       This time I am alone.
> of the house taunted us, saying they         This time I am alone.
> were going to close the place down and       This time it is a river.
> put us all in jail. Because my visa had      This time an inlet.
> expired months earlier, I knew I would       Waters rush through me.
> be deported. Although I had a return         A disorganized river.
> ticket to New York, I didn’t want to         This proof.
> go home. In addition to the fiancé I
> didn’t want to marry, I was estranged        This time I wake in the Chevy.
> from my father and stepmother, and I         My salmon face rises in the
> had left behind a heap of debt I didn’t        mirror.
> This time an ocean.
> know how to pay off. I couldn’t stay
> The days crash over me.
> in Cardiff, and I couldn’t go back to
> My name is Not Yet.
> New York, so I drank and got drunk.
> My name is Almost.
> Drank and got drunk. I finally decided
> My name is About to.
> to jump off a building. Then I thought
> (Stubborn Child 19)
> I should get my ear pierced instead.
> Then I thought maybe I should become          I did not want to move. I did not
> a Bahá’í. Suicide, ear pierced, become a   want to get up. I did not want to go
> Bahá’í: each made as much sense as the     to the Bahá’í meeting, but I had given
> next. I was twenty-one years old, and      Viv and Rita my word. I managed to
> my life was over. I drank harder.          stand, then stumbled into the house
> When I woke up on Sunday                and collapsed on the couch, which,
> morning I thought I was drowning.          surprisingly, had no one else crashing
> Actually, it was raining, and I was        on it. When I felt I could walk without
> lying in the gutter outside the house.     falling, I climbed the steps, put on dry
> I was, once again, “humiliation itself.”   clothes, went back out in the rain and
> Decades later I would write this poem:     walked to the stop to catch the bus to
> Newport and was soaked again.
> BAPTISM                        The meeting was on the second floor
> of a building in the middle of the city,
> This time I wake under a bridge.         not far from the Windsor Castle Hotel
> My ochre face rises in the rear          where my parents had met and where
> view mirror like a jaundiced sun.        I had lived as a baby, not far from St.
> This time my trousers are damp.          Mary’s Catholic Church where they
> This time my trousers are dry.           were married and I was baptized. I
> This time I wake in a gutter.            didn’t know how long the meeting
> Rain flows around me.                    would go on, but I figured I could
> take off around eleven, when the pubs
> Poetry and Transformation                              29
> 
> opened. The speaker from London was                The Bahá’ís are trying to rescue peo-
> Phillip Hinton. He was going on, but               ple, and there you are safe and sound
> I couldn’t follow what he was saying.              watching us from up the mountain. If
> He had a funny accent, not quite Brit-             you believe in Bahá’u’lláh, then you
> ish, but close enough. I learned later             need to help us change the world. You
> that he was from South Africa. When                need to become a Bahá’í.”
> he finished, I had fulfilled my obliga-                My stomach was roiling, my head
> tion to Viv and Rita and was about                 pounding, and I was chilled from
> to leave when they asked me to stay                sleeping in the rain. I needed a drink,
> for a cup of tea. I had the shakes and             and the pubs were now open. But this
> needed to get a real drink, but before I           man had just told me that if I be-
> could say no thanks, Hinton came over              lieved in Bahá’u’lláh, I should become
> and asked, “What do you think of the               a Bahá’í. Whenever I thought of the
> Bahá’í Faith?”                                     future, all I thought about was what I
> “It makes sense,” I said.                       would stock in my liquor cabinet and
> “Do you believe Bahá’u’lláh is God’s            how I would pay for it. But I had cut
> latest Manifestation?”                             back in the Lake District, and I didn’t
> “No . . . I’m not sure . . . I think so . . .   drink for a week in Limerick. Maybe
> maybe . . . I don’t know . . . probably . . .”     I could do it. My shaking got worse
> Rita handed me a cup of tea.                    and my tea spilled. This was a differ-
> “If you believe that Bahá’u’lláh                ent kind of shaking that seemed to
> is a Manifestation of God, you are a               come from within me. My whole body
> Bahá’í. You have to join us. We need               was trembling. I knew I couldn’t live a
> you.”                                              Bahá’í life, but I would have to try.
> “I can’t do that,” I said, panicking.               “OK,” I said.
> “I can’t live the kind of life Bahá’ís are             “OK?” Phillip asked, making sure.
> supposed to live, and I don’t want to be               “What do I do?”
> a hypocrite.”                                          Viv handed me a card and a pen.
> “You’re more of a hypocrite,” he                “Just sign this, Peter. That’s all there
> said, “if you believe in Bahá’u’lláh and           is to it.”
> don’t join us, than if you try to live a               It read, “In signing this card, I
> Bahá’í life and are not able to live up            declare my belief in Bahá’u’lláh, the
> to it.”                                            Promised One of God. I also recog-
> “What?” I said, not believing he just           nize the Báb, His Forerunner, and
> called me a hypocrite. I knew I was a              ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the Center of His Cove-
> screw-up, but I considered myself a                nant. I request enrollment in the Bahá’í
> sincere screw-up.                                  Community with the understanding
> “Listen,” he said. “Make believe                that Bahá’u’lláh has established sacred
> that a river is overflowing its banks              principles, laws and institutions which
> and is about to wipe out the village.              I must obey.”
> 30                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> “OK,” I said again, and signed.        out. How do I live a Bahá’í life? How
> However, I was shaking so badly my         do I not drink? How do I not screw
> signature was illegible. Viv looked it     up? What do I do now? I had no idea.
> over, then asked me to sign a second       A group of young Bahá’ís were going
> card. I tried not to shake so much, but    out to lunch and invited me to go with
> I couldn’t help it, and my signature       them. I asked question after question
> was just as bad. He handed me a third      about my new faith, partly because
> card.                                      I knew so little, but mostly because
> “I understand if you don’t want        I knew that as long as I stayed with
> me,” I said. “But I’m not going to do      them I wouldn’t drink. I was hoping
> it again.”                                 they would hang out with me until
> “Fair enough,” he said. “We’ll make    the pubs closed and, as if they’d read
> do.”                                       my mind, they did. On the bus back to
> Like that day four months earlier      Cardiff I felt better. I didn’t drink that
> sitting by the River Shannon, I felt as    day. I didn’t know what I would do
> if a great weight had been lifted from     the next day, but I would worry about
> me. Then I was surrounded by people        that in the morning. I had never heard
> who were congratulating me. I felt         of Alcoholics Anonymous, but I was
> like a celebrity. People started buying    doing “one day at a time” on my own.
> books from a table where they were         The next morning I woke up laugh-
> set out and gave them to me. One was       ing. I’d dreamed that an old man with
> a prayer book, which I didn’t think I      a white beard and white robes told me
> needed.                                    I was going to be all right. Looking
> “Here are the obligatory prayers,” a   through my new Bahá’í books, I saw a
> woman named Margaret said.                 picture of the old man. His name was
> “What does obligatory mean?” I         ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the son of Bahá’u’lláh.
> asked.                                     How did He get in my dream?
> “These are the prayers you have           Bahá’u’lláh said that I had to obey
> to say each day. There’s a long one,       the law of the land. This meant that
> a short one, and a medium sized one,       I had to leave the United Kingdom
> sort of like Goldilocks.”                  because my visa had expired. I had no-
> “You mean I have to pray? Every        where else to go, so I was forced to go
> day?” I knew Bahá’ís said prayers, but     home and make up with my family. A
> I didn’t know they had to.                 few years later, reading Frost, I came
> “Yes, that’s what Bahá’u’lláh says.    across, “Home is the place where, when
> You’ll get the hang of it.”                you have to go there, / They have to
> I wasn’t so sure, but if Bahá’u’lláh   take you in” (“The Death of the Hired
> said I should pray, I’d give it a shot,    Man,” 122–23). I wrote a letter to my
> even if I didn’t agree with it.            father, telling him that I had become a
> Meanwhile, I had a lot to figure       Bahá’í, that I was coming home, that
> Poetry and Transformation                            31
> 
> I would try to do better, that I hoped                        FIVE
> we could get along. Then I wrote to
> Mathew Kennedy telling him that I            Making up is hard to do. My father
> had become a Bahá’í and that I was           was happy to see me, but I’m not sure
> coming over to Ireland, and that if he       about my stepmother. I had to earn
> didn’t become a Bahá’í, I would beat         her trust, so I got a haircut, shaved my
> him up.                                      beard, and looked for a job. I wanted
> “No more fighting over religion,          to stay as far away from drinking as
> Peter,” Mathew wrote back. “I became         possible, so I couldn’t tend bar. I had
> a Bahá’í too. But come now and you’ll        no other skills, so I drove a cab and
> be here when we elect our first Nation-      memorized Bahá’í prayers while stuck
> al Spiritual Assembly.”4                     in Midtown traffic. I started with the
> A Bahá’í couple from Bristol, just        “Remover of Difficulties” because it
> over the English border, invited me to       was short, and I wanted to overcome
> their wedding the following weekend.         my fear that I would be “removed.” I
> I left Thursday and returned to the          worked my way up to the “Tablet of
> house in Cardiff on Monday. Yellow           Ahmad,” a tablet to one who’d spent
> crime tape covered the door. A neigh-        his life searching for his “Beloved.” I
> bor appeared. “What happened?” I             realized that I too had been searching,
> asked                                        but unlike Ahmad, who searched for
> “The police arrested all you drug         spiritual meaning, I was searching in
> addicts on Friday. They’ll be coming         the world of things. I realized that
> back for you as soon as I phone them,”       the search for truth didn’t end when
> she threatened.                              I became a Bahá’í. I had a lot to learn,
> If I hadn’t have become a Bahá’í,         but I wasn’t the best reader and didn’t
> I would not have gone to Bristol and         understand most of what I read. I
> would have been arrested too. I left in      went to the Bahá’í Center whenever
> a hurry and didn’t return to Cardiff         there was something going on and
> for three decades.                           met other Bahá’ís and came up with a
> plan. I drove my new Bahá’í friends to
> meetings around the city, asked them
> questions and paid attention to their
> 4 After serving as a member of the        answers.
> Auxiliary Board, which helps to protect         Six months later, my father got me a
> and propagate the Bahá’í Faith at the        job apprenticing as a heavy-equipment
> grassroots level, Matthew Kennedy is,        operator. Mostly, I ran brick hoists on
> at the time of this writing, a member of     small buildings in the outer boroughs,
> the National Spiritual Assembly which        but occasionally I operated a cherry
> oversees the administrative affairs of the   picker in Manhattan. I learned that
> Bahá’ís of Ireland.                          Bahá’ís believed service to others was
> 32                The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> important, and work done in the spir-      During my lunch break operating a
> it of service was like prayer. I didn’t    crane near 34th Street, I browsed the
> think hoisting bricks was very prayer-     bookstore in Penn Station and picked
> ful or that I was serving anybody. I       up Wishes, Lies and Dreams: Teaching
> was just paying my bills. I realized       Children to Write Poetry by Kenneth
> that I would have to go to college to do   Koch. This is what I want to do, teach
> something more meaningful, but that        kids to read and write poetry. I was
> hadn’t worked the first three times,       going to be an English major. I took
> and I wasn’t sure it would go any bet-     a placement test, which I failed so
> ter now. But I thought, if I’m smart       badly I was assigned to a remedial
> enough to recognize God’s messenger,       class where I was one of three native
> maybe I’m smart enough to make it for      English speakers. I complained to the
> more than a semester.                      head of the English department that
> I showed up at Queens College to        this was a mistake. After all, I was a
> register as a non-matriculated student,    poet.
> taking courses at night. I didn’t need a      “No,” he said, looking at my writing
> transcript or test results. I could en-    sample. “You belong there.”
> roll in courses that had empty seats.         He handed me my paper, which
> “What do you want to study?” a          had no capitalization or punctuation.
> counselor asked.                           When I tried to explain why I didn’t
> One of the Bahá’ís told me that         use it, he just shook his head. I spent a
> agriculture is important, so I said        year in remedial English and learned
> “agriculture.”                             to read and write.
> “Agriculture?” the counselor asked.        I read Bahá’í books that expanded
> “We’re in New York City. Do you see        my thinking far more that drugs ever
> any farms around here?”                    did. I continued writing poems, which
> “Farms?” I didn’t know agriculture      seemed more substantial than the ones
> was about farms. “Uh . . .” I answered.    I’d written before. I wanted to ex-
> “What do you have that’s close?”           press—no, I wanted to reveal and un-
> He looked at the counselor next to      derstand the changes in my life. I was
> him. She shrugged her shoulders and        clinging to sobriety, though I didn’t
> said, “Geology?”                           know that word yet. I was clinging to
> I wasn’t sure what geology was ei-      this new religion, trying not to screw
> ther, but I was embarrassed for being so   up. I wasn’t sure that I was making
> stupid and wanted to get out of there,     progress. Then I remembered climb-
> so I said “geology,” and they helped       ing the Old Man of Coniston in the
> me fill out the paperwork. I liked ge-     Lake District. When I looked at the
> ology, but I knew I couldn’t major in      top of the mountain, I saw how far
> it because I wasn’t smart enough to        I had to go and didn’t think I would
> take hard science and advanced math.       make it, but when I looked down, I
> Poetry and Transformation                            33
> 
> saw how high I had climbed and didn’t       life, the eternal questioning. The
> want to fall. I wrote a poem, trying to     point is that the question is all. It
> understand this transformation.             encompasses awe, wonder, hope,
> faith and doubt, confusion, de-
> FRUITION                      spair . . . (Commonweal 331)
> 
> A tree entered my mind                   Turns out they didn’t hit me up
> preparing for sleep                   for seven dollars. The writer, Hannerl
> growing deep                          Ebenhoech-Liebmann, went on to
> in the night                          compare my poem to Goethe and El-
> and grew                              iot. I was flabbergasted. Could one of
> neither blossoms nor fruit            my friends have written the letter as a
> joke? But I doubted any of my friends
> a yawn branches in waking             had ever heard of Goethe and Eliot.
> roaring with leaves                   The letter ends with these remarks:
> while there’s all this
> waiting                                    . . . Peter Murphy’s “Fruition” is
> what time do the flowers start          poetry proper. Why? It is one of
> (Commonweal 209)            those poems of which Robert Nye
> says that they so uncomfortably
> I sent it to Commonweal, which          and unforgettably give him the
> not only published it but mailed me a       sense “that they read me, rather
> check for seven dollars. A few weeks        than I them, and that they crit-
> later Commonweal sent me a tear sheet       icize me, rather than I make the
> announcing the publication of their         judgment.” (Commonweal 351)
> fiftieth-year anthology, which cost, of
> course, seven dollars.                       “Poetry proper,” really? I must be a
> Ha. They wanted their money back.     real poet.
> I wrote out the check, and as I was
> about to seal the envelope, I noticed                       SIX
> my name on the back of the tear sheet:
> It is March 26, 2012. I am standing in
> To the Editors: Peter Murphy’s       front of the terraced house in Cardiff,
> “Fruition” is a poem I learned by       Wales, where forty years earlier I woke
> heart. Its impact dawned on me,         up in the gutter. The urge to drink has
> slowly and gradually, just as the       certainly decreased but hasn’t gone
> “tree . . . growing deep in the         away. In 1987, after being sober for
> night.” Its meaning burst open          fifteen years, I started having drinking
> “in waking roaring with leaves”         dreams that terrified me so much they
> as it approaches the mystery of         drove me to AA. I began to talk about
> 34                 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 24.3/4 2014
> 
> drinking, which—too embarrassed,
> especially around Bahá’ís—I’d never
> done. I started to write about it as well.
> 
> THE DESIRE
> 
> Last night I dreamt I was drinking again
> and got drunk, and walked out on the quiet life
> I’ve been living these last few years.
> I watched as I let my family go—
> The wife who understood and would not forgive,
> The child who clung to my loose clothing, crying
> Don’t go, Daddy don’t go, take Mommy and me
> with you.
> I remember saying that too, grabbing the coat
> of my own father as he swung his arms around
> to touch me. And I trailed him
> as he followed his father until I let go.
> 
> I fell back into sleep, into dreams—
> There were rivers I had to cross and recross,
> and fires starting in every forest I came to,
> and cars screeching around corners,
> about to go off a cliff,
> about to crash in a desert
> where I am thirsty all the time.
> (Stubborn Child 55)
> 
> But this is not an occasion for poet-       turned back from Thee, Thou
> ry; it is an occasion for prayer. Look-        didst graciously aid me to turn
> ing down at the gutter, I recite “Bless-       towards Thee. I was as one dead,
> ed is the Spot.” I recite the “Remover         Thou didst quicken me with the
> of Difficulties.” I recite a prayer for        water of life . . . (Bahá’í Prayers
> gratitude:                                     19)
> 
> . . . What tongue can voice my                While I will never be a “scintillating
> thanks to Thee? I was heedless,            star,” I am no longer “humiliation
> Thou didst awaken me. I had                itself,” and I am grateful.
> Poetry and Transformation                            35
> 
> WORKS CITED
> 
> ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. The Promulgation of Universal Peace. Wilmette, IL: Bahá’í Publishing
> Trust, 1982. Print.
> The Báb, Bahá’u’lláh, and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Bahá’í Prayers: A Selection of Prayers
> Revealed by Bahá’u’lláh, the Báb, and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Wilmette, IL: Bahá’í
> Publishing Trust, 1991. Print.
> Cummings, E. E. Is 5. New York: Liveright, 1996. Print.
> Ebenhoech-Liebmann, Hannerl. “Poetry Proper.” Commonweal 99.12 (1973): 331.
> Print.
> Frost, Robert. “The Death of the Hired Man.” Selected Poems of Robert Frost. New
> York. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1962. Print.
> Hopkins, Gerard Manley. “God’s Grandeur.” Poems and Prose of Gerard Manley
> Hopkins. Baltimore. Penguin. 1967. Print.
> Keats, John. “[On Negative Capability: Letter to George and Tom Keats, Decem-
> ber 1818.]” Letters of John Keats. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.
> Print.
> Lennon, John. “Imagine.” Imagine. EMI Records Ltd., 1971. CD.
> MacLeish, Archibald. “Ars Poetica.” Poetry Foundation, n.d. Web. 11 July 2014.
> Murphy, Peter E. Stubborn Child. New York: Jane Street Press, 2005. Print.
> ———. “Ars Poetica.” Many Mountains Moving: A Literary Journal of Diverse
> Contemporary Voices (Fall 1998): 93. Print.
> ———. “Fruition.” Commonweal 99.8 (1973): 209. Print.
> Rilke, Rainer Maria. “Archaic Torso of Apollo.” American Academy of Poets, n.d.
> Web. 13 July 2014.
> Shakespeare, William. As You Like It. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare,
> n.d. Web. 13 July 2014.
> Stevens, Wallace. “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Bird.” Poems, Wallace
> Stevens. New York: Vintage, 1954. Print.
> Williams, William Carlos. “Asphodel, That Greeny Flower.” Selected Poems. New
> York: New Directions, 1969. Print.
> ———. “Paterson, Book 1.” Paterson. New York: New Directions, 1995. Print.
> ———. “The Manoeuvre.” Selected Poems. New York: New Directions, 1985.
> Print.
> Wordsworth, William. A Choice of Wordsworth’s Verse. Ed. R.S. Thomas. London:
> Faber and Faber, 1971. Print.
> ———. Lyrical Ballads. Ed. Derek Roper. London and Glasgow: Collins, 1968.
> Print.
> Flight of the Paper Cranes
> TAMI HAALAND
> It started as a sad day. Sometimes you get
> more than you want. I settled in. We all
> settled and expected nothing but haze.
> 
> Then the colored box arrived. A little
> square of patterned sheets and cardboard.
> I lifted the lid and admired the perfect corners.
> 
> Inside, stacks of color, rows of blue umbrellas,
> tiny flowers, repetitive wide lines.
> Golden shine or primary pigment.
> 
> My friend Jane took the first sheet. We watched her
> fold and fold again until she had a red paper crane.
> She put it in the center of the floor, then started another.
> 
> I lifted a sheet from the stack, blue like
> Mediterranean doorways or deep sky. Every fold
> she made, I copied. For her, this crane
> 
> sang purple. We set them on the floor.
> The others joined in and watched our folds.
> The cranes multiplied and colors quadrupled.
> 
> Some kind of resonance emerged. Not jittery
> but joyful. That’s all it was. The word vibrant
> described what happened in our cells
> 
> and in the ascending pile of cranes. We didn’t stop.
> It became our work. We gave cranes to our friends,
> to people who only saw gray, to our families.
> 
> We planned ways we could get them further out.
> We mailed a box of bright cranes to the mayor,
> and news people came with their cameras.
> 
> They asked why we did this. We said
> we’re solving it. Watch, we said, you’ll see.
>
> — *Poetry and Transformation (Used by permission of the curator)*